The Trouble with Templeton – Rookie
It’s been almost a year since The Trouble with Templeton released their single Six Months in a Cast. The band has certainly grown as a five piece since then with spots at both Harvest and Falls Festival and a stint overseas in the US at SXSW.
Created with the help of Brisbane producer Matt Redlich (Emma Louise, Hungry Kids of Hungary) Rookie is technically the first full-length album from this Brisbane five piece following the release of their 2011 mini album Bleeders. It’s wispy but also gutsy folk rock, offering up a more technical, established indie sound.
Meaningful words sung to strong lyrical melodies are present throughout including the brilliant line on Flowers in Bloom ‘The operation went well, and I believe in you. But I still can’t tell, which part they removed,’ alluding to a deeper wisdom and spectrum of poetic content from front man Thomas Calder since 2011’s Bleeders.
Motifs to-die-for appear from different band members throughout with Pianist Betty Yeowart’s darling melodic piano during the bridge in Six Months in a Cast and the brilliant ascent vs. descent of major guitar scales in the band’s latest single You are New which is clearly the standout of the album. Ritchie Daniell’s drumming during Climate provides an eclectic feel to what’s strategically placed as the ‘interlude’ song half way through the album. His drum fillers combined with echo-like vocals almost make the tune sound like a snippet from an Animal Collective album.
With less punch is the opening track Whimpering Child and latter songs I Recorded You and Soldiers, however the album offers a beautiful finale with the acoustic Lint emerging with an almost Sigur Ros type build till the very last note.
This band has a stunningly full sound, perfectly balancing the delicate divide between soft and light. Each song has these amazing layers and a way of building slowly to an epic finish or a sudden stripped back version of itself. With Rookie and a healthy dose of airplay gracing eardrums at the moment, The Trouble with Templeton are quickly cementing themselves in our musical minds as a well informed, well oiled quintet.
– Vivienne Hill
